Menendez Launches Big Oil Subsidy Tracker

As we head into the Memorial Day holiday, and move from one congressional recess to another [PDF], Senator Bob Menendez (D-NJ) has given us something to do with our extra free time: Watch taxpayer subsidies to big oil climb higher and higher.

The clock, dubbed a STOP watch (for “Stop Taxpayer Oil Payouts”), tracks the amount of money that has flowed through a tax loophole for oil companies since the spring of 2010, when the Senate failed to close it even as the Deepwater Horizon wreck spewed crude into the Gulf of Mexico.

According to the senator’s website, “The Big 5 oil companies are raking in more than $76.00 a second” thanks to the tax loophole. That means that over $24 million will have been added to the tally after the long weekend.

Word On The Street

“The contractors want the money, the politicians want to be able to claim credit for
projects, and the engineers want to complete every project that was ever
represented by a dotted line on a map -- no matter how long ago it was
conceived nor how the perceived need has changed.”